More Than a Fantasy (3 page)

She considered all the possibilities and how to phrase them.
Take me. Claim me. Make me so hot I beg for it.

Then she asked herself, as she stared into his soul-deep eyes, what did she want most? What was her true fantasy?

Finally, as she drifted off into a relaxed sleep, she told him exactly what she wanted. “Get me off this damned island.”

“How was she, brother?” Poseidon demanded when Tiran returned to their city beneath the sea. “Was she worth the effort?”

Tiran tried to ignore him. He drifted past Poseidon on a cool current and headed toward his private chambers.

“Tell me you fulfilled your desires with her?” Poseidon morphed into a stream of blue water and anxiously circled his brother.

Tiran had to change direction to avoid moving through his brother’s widespread molecules. “I left her sleeping on the beach, untouched.”

The confession made Poseidon laugh. “She refused you? In the days when our race ruled this planet, an Atlantean male would never have taken no for an answer from a human female.”

“And they brought shame on our people that has lasted to this day. My meeting with her was not about conquest, Poseidon. I discovered that she’s trapped. She wiles away her time dreaming up diversions, but her deepest desire is to escape from the island where she’s been exiled.”

Poseidon crossed his newly formed arms over his chest, and considered his brother’s revelation. “So she entices us, but has no intention of making good on the promises of her body?”

“Wanting a man is only a small part of her true desire. She wants her freedom more than anything.” Tiran tried to move past his brother.

Poseidon blocked his way, his brow furrowed with curiosity. “A human female exiled. Why?”

“Her father has enemies who would harm her if they found her. To keep her safe, he has forced her to live here, away from the world.”

“And you took this information from her mind while she lay open to you?”

“No.” Tiran morphed into a strong current and slithered away from his brother. He spoke without words as he headed for the royal burrow and the privacy he craved. “She told me this while we lay on the beach, talking. I put her in a dream state to relax her, since I sensed you had frightened her with your demanding attitude.”

Poseidon shrugged. “So your efforts were wasted. Ah well, there are other females, brother. I’m sure you’ll have no trouble finding a willing one.”

Tiran slipped into his chambers, where he returned to his natural form. His time with Mara had been both enlightening and frustrating. He’d expected to discover her darkest sexual fantasies and act them out, pleasuring her in ways she’d never forget. He still longed to do that, but now he wanted more. He wanted to give his beautiful sand maiden her most urgent desire.

He wanted to set her free.

* * * *

Mara closed the fourth leather-bound volume of Greek mythology and tossed it across the polished reading table. It landed with a satisfying thump next to the others.

Still frustrated, she leaned back in her chair and rubbed her tired eyes. She’d been in the library since sunrise, scouring the stacks for references on Poseidon. She’d found scads of information on the mythological God of the Sea, son of Cronus and Rhea, brother to both Hades and Zeus, among others, and father to illegitimate half-human creatures, demigods, warriors and kings. Nowhere could she locate the name “Tiran.” As she read and read, she became more convinced that her strange encounter on the beach the day before had been nothing more than a dream, despite how real it felt.

After all, the two men certainly weren’t members of her father’s security staff. If they were residents of one of the nearby islands, they’d have arrived by boat and been detected immediately. Even local fisherman approached the island only with Thanatos’
s
express permission.

The fact that Poseidon had seemed to liquefy before diving under the waves cinched it. She’d obviously imagined the whole thing.

The human brain was an amazing construct, she decided, with the ability to create its own reality at times. Phenomena like lucid dreaming, out of body experiences, and visual and auditory hallucinations could occur if someone was stressed, frightened, overly medicated, fevered, exhausted, malnourished or mentally ill.

Could abject boredom produce such a vivid dream as well? Mara wondered. Or was she slowly losing her mind?

She rose and stretched, easing the kinks in her back with a yoga posture. Mid-pose, her father appeared, his gray eyebrows raised.

“You’re going to pull a muscle,” he admonished.

Mara straightened and allowed herself to laugh. “I do yoga to relax my muscles, Papa.”

“You’ve been reading, I see.” Thanatos fingered the stack of discarded mythology books. “Non-fiction today?”

Mara
began
returning the books to the shelves. “I just became very curious about the subject and decided to do some research. Maybe I’ll start a series of fantasy paintings based on mythological characters.”

Her father seemed to approve, and for the first time in months, a sparkle lit his dark eyes. “You’ll need blue paint, won’t you?”

She laughed again and put away the final books. “I suppose I will. Good thing I hadn’t gotten around to throwing it out.”

An awkward silence enveloped them. Thanatos stared at his daughter and opened his mouth to speak.

A high-pitched beeping interrupted him, and both he and Mara froze. She’d been trained to fear the security alarms. The Zander family estates always possessed state-of-the-art systems, and when an alarm sounded, it invariably meant real trouble.

“Stay here until I call you,” he said, heading for the library door.

Mara nodded, torn between her own curiosity and the instinct to obey her father and protect herself as she’d been taught. She finally decided to find out for herself what was happening.

At the north end of the compound, farthest from her secluded private beach, Thanatos’
s
security station ran like a miniature military operation. A secure underground tunnel connected the security bunker and the barracks to the Zander family residence. Mara jogged through the tunnel and emerged in the tiny command center, where one of her father’s security guards, a man named Zeke, blocked her way.

“Sorry, Miss Zander. For your own safety, please stay back.”

“What’s happening? Papa?” Mara stood on tiptoe to look over Zeke’s shoulder. With two other men, her father leaned over a bank of television monitors and seemed oblivious to her presence.

The alarm claxon abruptly shut off. Mara’s ears rebelled, ringing loudly in the sudden silence.

“It was larger than a fishing boat,” one of the guards said to Thanatos. “It appeared about a hundred yards off shore. It showed up on radar for thirty seconds then vanished.”

“You’ve got nothing on the monitors?” Thanatos was all business, like a military commander. Mara often wondered what her father might have accomplished if he’d chosen to work within the law. Thanatos Zander had decades of experience in politics, business, war strategy, electronics and even psychology. He could have been anything. She often felt guilty wishing he had chosen a profession
that would have allowed her a normal life, like those of her friends.

Tears stung her tired eyes as she watched him checking video footage of the calm ocean and deserted shoreline. She grieved for the man her father could have been, a man whose daughter didn’t have to hide or fear for her life every time an alarm sounded.

“Perhaps it was a dense school of fish, or a piece of submerged wreckage,” the guard said.

Thanatos shook his head. “The shape you showed me on the readout was too regular. It was definitely a boat.”

“A boat that sank?”

“Possibly. I want someone out there checking on it. If nothing suspicious turns up in the next twelve hours, we’ll consider it a fluke. Recalibrate all the equipment. I want a guarantee that we don’t have a malfunction.”

“Yes, sir.”

Mara made sure she was gone before her father turned around. She didn’t want him to find her spying on him, and have to listen to a lecture about keeping herself safe in an emergency. Zeke would probably tell Thanatos that she’d been there anyway, and he would scold her at dinner, but for now, she had a reprieve.

She hurried back through the tunnel and headed for her studio. Since there was nothing else to do, the idea for that series of mythological paintings suddenly appealed to her. If her fantasy men were indeed all in her mind, she could give them life by committing them to canvas.

* * * *

Tiran sat in the royal archives, a pile of data chips scattered on the work surface in front of him. After half a day of intense research into Atlantean law and history, he’d discovered a few little-known clauses that might allow him to intervene in Mara’s situation and end her exile. He’d have to approach his father and the Triumvirate—and he’d have to admit to having congress with her and face punishment for his transgressions, but that would be a small price to pay to do as he’d promised and make her fantasy come true.

A familiar shape drifted into the archive structure and settled in front of Tiran before morphing into Poseidon in humanoid form. His brother eyed the data chips and smirked. “You always did have a penchant for learning. What are you submerged in today?”

Tiran quickly gathered the chips
together
, hoping Poseidon would not be able to identify the subject matter before he put them away. “DNA manipulation. You know I’ve always been consumed with the problem of Atlantean mutation.”

Poseidon yawned. “Oh, that again. Aren’t there enough scientists working on that problem? Why waste your time? You’ve got exemplary DNA, as do I. We both should be out enticing females to mate with us, rather than worrying about helping other males make offspring that will one day compete with our own for power.”

Tiran sighed. In truth, he felt guilty that he hadn’t actually been researching his chosen subject. It still confounded Atlantean scientists that some citizens could morph and others could not. Those born without the ability faced a significant disadvantage in the underwater communities.

“My research keeps my mind vital, Poseidon. You should try it yourself.” Tiran rose and dumped the data chips into the sorter, which would automatically return them to their storage units. He felt immense relief that his brother hadn’t questioned him further on the subjects covered by the chips.

“I’ve better things to do, brother. Now, would you like to go to the Gemstone Caverns with me this afternoon?”

“I’ve other things to tend to. Why don’t you take Lalia? She’s anxious to get you alone, and I’m sure you could find a private niche in the caverns together.”

Poseidon considered. “Lalia…yes. That’s exactly what I’ll do. And you, brother? More boring research?”

“Yes. Lots more boring research.”

“Suit yourself.”

Poseidon left the archive,
and
Tiran waited a few moments to make sure his brother wouldn’t be nearby when he followed. He did have plenty to occupy him, and with Poseidon disporting with Lalia in the Gemstone Caverns, he’d be free to do as he pleased for a few uninterrupted hours.

* * * *

To Mara’s surprise, it was Poseidon who took shape on her first canvas. Even though thoughts of Tiran’s blue eyes and sexy smile plagued her while she sketched, the underlying frustration in her soul made her draw Poseidon’s cruel smile and beguiling green eyes.

He stood naked on a rock overlooking the sea in a pose that displayed his powerful thighs and thickly muscled back. She longed to add his impressive erection, but instead positioned him so his firm buttocks showed rather than his genitals. In his outstretched hand he held his namesake’s mythical trident, which he used to command a bolt of lightning to strike a monstrous shape submerged in the surging ocean tide. As an afterthought, Mara sketched a maiden into the scene. Naked except for what would become a pearlescent net of sea foam, the woman’s legs ended in delicate scaled fins. Her long red hair whipped about her face in a violent wind, and she reached out with a graceful hand, imploring Poseidon with her gesture.

Whether she beseeched him to destroy the sea monster or spare it, Mara hadn’t yet decided.

The story took shape in her mind as she began applying a base layer of dark gray to the sea and the sky to create roiling waves and clouds. In her mind, the woman had befriended the hideous sea creature and frolicked with it in the shallows, but the impetuous Poseidon assumed the monster meant to harm her, so he dragged her away from it. Tossing her behind him in the sand, he set about destroying it to prove his bravery to the maiden.

When the creature lay belly up in the waves, he would turn triumphantly to the nymph and find her grieving for the creature, her friend.

Tears welled in Mara’s eyes. She worked in the dark browns of the rocks, the deep blues of the waves and the black of the sea monster’s gnarled hide.